The first time I went to the Cleveland Stadium was on Memorial Day in 1965 to see the Cleveland Indians play a doubleheader against the Detroit Tigers.
Once upon a time, for me and many thousands of others, the fail safe formula was: Baseball + Memorial Day = Doubleheader. It was the moment, more perhaps even than Opening Day itself, when baseball was back in our lives. The Memorial Day doubleheader was then a fixture on the baseball calendar—as was also true of holiday doubleheaders on July 4 and Labor Day.
.
What Happened to The Holiday DH?
on July 4 and Labor Day.
That was then, this is now. To state the obvious, Holiday Day doubleheaders—as indeed doubleheaders in general—are no more. The opportunity cost of "two games for the price of one" is just too great in terms of the contemporary economics of the sport—not to mention that the excessive length of the typical game today would make the prospect of sitting through two of them unwelcome to any fan over the age of eight.
Ernie Banks was famous for saying, "It's a beautiful day for baseball—let's play two" but today's players would hardly embrace working such a double shift. They have the strength of what must be the most powerful private sector unions behind them, to back them up.
Holidays are no longer big deals at the ball park. Perhaps the same might be generally said of the shift of Memorial Day from May 30 to the last Monday in May, a triumph of convenience over commemoration.
In Boston or New York or Philadelphia, or in Detroit or Cleveland or Chicago for that matter, Memorial Day meant the imminent coming of summer and of a season where life could and would be lived outdoors, whether at home, "in the country"—or at the ballpark.
Call it progress, or indeed necessity, but as holidays comes around this year and once again (and, I suppose, forevermore) no doubleheaders will be played, I will pause to remember how baseball commemorated Memorial Day in times gone by—by playing two.
"Let's play two!"